PROFILPELAJAR.COM

Feast of Saint Raphael
Feast of Saint Raphael
	Pandal in Ollur Junction made for the annual feast of Saint Raphael
Genre	Church festivals
Dates	23, 24 October
Location(s)	Ollur, Thrissur, Kerala
Founded	1718
Attendance	1,00,000 above
Patron(s)	Saint Antony
Website	http://ollurshrine.org/

The Feast of Saint Raphael or Malakhayude Perunnal is an annual festival held in Ollur, near Thrissur, Kerala (India), since 1839. It draws thousands of pilgrims.^[1] The Ollur forane church, founded in 1718 and dedicated to St Anthony, also houses a shrine of Raphael the Archangel.^[2] It is one of the oldest churches built in 18th-century Kerala. The festival, held on 23 and 24 October of each year, is one of the most important Christian festivals in Kerala. The festival starts with the hoisting of the ceremonial flag on 15 October to mark the beginning of the celebrations in the church compound.^[3] It is one of half a dozen Christian festivals listed by Kerala Tourism as among the attractions of the state.^[4]

References

^ A. Sreedhara Menon, Social and Cultural History of Kerala (1979), p. 232.
^ José Pereira, Baroque India: The Neo-Roman Religious Architecture of South Asia (2000), pp. 139-140.
^ "Ollur Church Fete Begins on 23 October" The Hindu, 10 October 2004.
^ Kerala Tourism Archived 7 March 2010 at the Wayback Machine, accessed 29 Oct. 2009